The Liberal Coalition

Saturday, November 27, 2004

Majority of the Majority

Launching his bid to send his party back to another 40 years in the minority, House Speaker Dennis Hastert announced a new guideline for introducing legislation in the House: only bills which have the support of "the majority of the majority" will be considered. That is, if the majority of House Republicans don't support a bill, that bill will never see the light of day.

There's really not much the Democrats can do to stand in Hastert's way (other than repeated use of an arduous parliamentary procedure known as a discharge petition), so I say they should follow Hastert's example. Specifically, Democrats in the Senate should impose a rule that they will filibuster any legislation which does not have the support of a majority of their caucus.

(To see the surprising reason why this makes sense, see the rest at edwardpig.)